Sir William Colin Mackenzie PRSA FRSE (9 March 1877 – 29 June 1938) was an Australian anatomist, benefactor, museum administrator and director.
Returning to Australia, he found there was then a severe epidemic of infantile paralysis, and was able to use his newly acquired knowledge of the principles of muscle rest and recovery.
He leased land at Badger Creek, near Healesville, which subsequently became the Colin Mackenzie sanctuary, and he spent much time on the unravelling of the anatomical details of the koala, the platypus, the wombat, and other Australian animals.
Early in 1915 he went to England, did further work in anatomy, and assisted Sir Arthur Keith in the cataloguing of war specimens.
Another book published in 1918 was the seventh edition of Treves's Surgical Applied Anatomy, in the revision of which Mackenzie had collaborated with Sir Arthur Keith.
Mackenzie returned to Melbourne in 1918, taking a house at 612 St Kilda Road converting a part of it into a museum and laboratory; from 1919 this was called the Australian Institute of Anatomical Research.
In 1924 an act was passed establishing the Australasian Institute of Anatomical Research to house the collection at Canberra, and Mackenzie was made the first director with the title of Professor of Comparative Anatomy.
Mackenzie was granted permissive occupancy of around 32 ha (80 acres) of bushland at Badger Creek, Healesville, by the State authorities as a field station for his research in 1920.
He was president of the zoological section of the Australian and New Zealand Association for the Advancement of Science in 1928, was a fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, and was knighted in 1929.